Supreme Court Restores Waqf Board Injunction Over 16 Acres 5 Guntas Of Inam Land, Finding Vendors Had No Right To Sell it

The Wakf Board sued for a permanent injunction concerning “Mafi Inam” lands adjoining the Qutub Shahi Mosque, Dargah and graveyard, claiming the lands were wakf property and that the defendants were interfering with its possession.

The Trial Court granted the injunction.

The High Court set it aside, reasoning that the Board had not established possession through an occupancy certificate or revenue records, while the defendants relied on pattadar passbooks.

The Board appealed.

The record included a Survey Commissioner’s report and a 1989 Gazette notification listing the relevant survey numbers and extents as wakf property; the defendants’ vendors had not challenged the notification.

Under Anathula Sudhakar v. P. Buchi Reddy, a suit for injunction simpliciter may suffice where the plaintiff is in lawful possession and faces interference or a threat of dispossession; a declaration is necessary where a denial or competing claim raises a cloud over title, and a plaintiff out of possession must seek possession.

Balkrishna Dattatraya Galande v. Balkrishna Ram Bharose Gupta concerns the need to establish possession for injunctive relief, assessed on the evidence in the particular case.

Under Sections 4 and 5(2) of the Wakf Act, 1954, a surveyed wakf may be included in the published list of wakfs; under Section 6, a dispute concerning inclusion in that list had to be raised within one year, a period judicially interpreted to run from the date of knowledge.

The Court found that the Survey Commissioner’s report and the Gazette notification identified the mosque, Dargah, graveyard and associated lands as wakf property, including the relevant survey numbers.

The defendants’ vendors’ names in older pahani records and the defendants’ pattadar passbooks did not establish a valid title or prove the defendants’ possession; the vendors’ possession, if any, arose from an entrustment for the maintenance of the religious institution, not an ownership right permitting sale.

The vendors had not challenged the Gazette notification within the prescribed period, nor was any later date of knowledge asserted.

The Court therefore found no cloud over the Board’s title and no basis to disturb the Trial Court’s injunction; the cited injunction precedents did not justify the High Court’s decision on these facts.

It dismissed both contempt petitions, finding no reason to entertain them, and rejected any pending applications.